Our Distance Matrix is a service designed to measure the relevant distance between any two objects on the map, and it also helps calculate the time of your travel between certain checkpoints.
Our technology is protected from unauthorized use by restricting API calls to those who provide the correct authentication credentials. These account details are in the form of an API key, also called an access token. It is a unique alphanumeric string that verifies that you are a user of the Distancematrix.ai services and grants you access.
In this guide, we tell you about the crucial points of the Distance Matrix API key. You will find out what it is for, how to get and use it, and its application restriction.
Purpose of Distance Matrix API keys
In addition to identifying the user, an API key authenticates requests and associates them with your account and project. Authenticated requests provide statistics of your Distance Matrix API use. These statistics are the base for billing purposes. About the billing and payment process, you can read in the FAQ.
In addition, you can easily track and control your usage statistics in the admin panel (page Usage). Knowing your current use, you can always predict your payment amounts.
You can find detailed price information at https://distancematrix.ai/pricing.
Getting Distance Matrix API keys
To get the API key for Distance Matrix API (also called an access token), you need to register to our platform.
After the registration, you will get instant access to the admin panel, where you will find up to five free tokens for your apps. You will also get an automatic email with all the necessary information on how to start. The email also contains links to useful pages and instructions, information about restrictions, etc.
Please note that if your project requires more than five keys, you have to upgrade to the Growth plan.
Adding the Distance Matrix API key to your request
Restrictions of Distance Matrix API keys
For security reasons, we may impose some restrictions on access tokens. For example, for all free tokens, there is a limit on the total number of elements you can obtain during a month. After you have used all the elements, you can switch to the Growth paid plan.
With a free plan, you don’t have any other restrictions or feature limits, so you can test all the functionality of our APIs.
With paid usage, there are no limits on the number of elements you can request per month. But restrictions are set on the number of items in the query (if it goes not about the asynchronous requests) and the calculation time. The default limits for the synchronous requests are 100 elements per request. You can contact us if you have some concerns about these limits.
If you want to set up additional restrictions for your tokens, please feel free to email to our support team.
We can conclude that our Distance Matrix API service suggests a much easier procedure for obtaining access to a credentials page than their analogs like Google, TomTom, and Bing. You can get a similar level of accuracy with the best world examples for a competitive price. Moreover, we provide reliable support throughout the entire period of using our product.
